A few weeks ago I discovered a woman "prophet" at You Tube and got interested enough to listen to a few of her videos. It's quite sad really. The woman is likeable, I wish she hadn't been seduced by her Pentecostal upbringing into accepting the communications she gets that she claims come from Jesus. She's obviously completely sold on them and thinks they are meant for other Christians, so she reports them on her You Tube videos. This is not a well known teacher so maybe I shouldn't give her name, just somebody who does these videos, and there must be many more like her, probably many with a bigger following, but she's an interesting example of the phenomenon.
She mentions from time to time that she gets comments that criticize what she's doing and she just deletes them, so there's no point in adding my own to her list. She probably won't see anything I write here either but if she did I'd just want to tell her she's believing a lie and to please please please rethink what she's doing. It would mean opposing her Pentecostal upbringing. It would be very hard. It was even hard for me to cut myself loose from the charismatic frame of reference I got caught in back in the nineties and I was a new Christian with none of the inherited baggage she carries, so for her to give it up would be a mnumental undertaking. I can only pray that God would show her the way. I had to stop and rethink all kinds of experiences I had had of a supernatural sort that the charmismatic movement, same as the Pentecostals, treat as coming from God. The "gift of tongues" for instance, which I received one day when I was praying out loud in my bedroom. All these incomprehensible phrases just came out of my mouth and formed a repeating pattern. I could start and stop them but I didn't determine the sounds themselves, they were independent of me. Definitely "supernatural" but from what source?
It wasn't long before I recognized that the sounds had no feeling of worship in them, no reverential feeling, they were just babbling, repeating patterns that mimicked language, and eventually they came along with little tunes such as
Three Blind Mice I was supposed to regard this phenomenon as coming from God? Well, once you are into a supernatural experience it is very very hard to convince yourself it is not from God because of all the pressure you get from the charismatic or Pentecostal movements, no matter how silly or unChristian it seems. "We are Christians" you will be told, therefore we cannot receive supernatural phenomena from demons. We are not to doubt that it is a work of the Holy Spirit, that would be to blaspheme the Holy Spirit which is the unforgiveable sin. With all that biblical-sounding propaganda being heaped on you it is very hard to begin to see through it and recognize it as the demonic deception it is.
I did succeed in extricating myself from it and left the movement but I had lingering doubts for years that were only finally dispelled by the Strange Fire Conference at John MacArthur's church some years ago. They made it very clear that what are practiced as "the gifts of the Spirit" are no such thing. They have nothing whatever to do with the experiences in the New Testament that are desribed as those supernatural gifts. The "tongues" are not actual languages as they are in the New Testament. So they'll tell you they are an angelic language because of a comment Paul made, an angelic lanugage you have no way of verifying since who has heard angeles speak it? But the fact that the main gift was the speaking of actual human languages is NOT practiced at all should be enough to discredit the pracdtice as charismatics and Pentecostals experience it.
The "healings" always turn out to be some kind of illusion so that takes care of the supposed supernatural gift of healing. It's not that God can't give such healings if He wants to and perhaps does on some occasionns, but as a gift possessed by an individual it doesn't bear scrutiny. The "gift of prophecy" is often little more than a sort of psychic reading, and sometimes involves out and out demonic deception which is pretty clearly what is going on with this prophet I'm talking about.
One influence that made a big difference to me was Watchman Nee's book on "Soul Power" in whicb he identifies powers he believes belonged to Adam and Ever berfore the Fall that may still show up in distorted form in certain individuals, such as psychic powers. In other words these phenomena don't have to be demonicm they can be of the flesh though not in the usual sense. He also very clearly exposed what was known in the nineties as "holy laughter" that took over in some charistmatic churches and was considered to be a true Holy Spirit revival although it is one of the silliest manifestations that ever happened. He says that this phenomenon occurred in some Chinese churches some decades earlier and that it was certainly not of the Holy Spirit.
If such arguments are not convincing to someone who gets these visions and dreams, at least she should give the actual content of her "prophecies" some serious scrutiny because they violate the portrait of Jesus found in scripture. She sees in a dream a chariot drawn by horses manned by someone she called "Jesus." It's a one-man Roman style chariot the driver stands up in. She applies no critical thought to it. For starters it's highly improbably that Jesus would be driving a Roman chariot if He drove one at all. The only chariot in scripture that came down from heaven and picked up the prophet Elijah, is identified as the Chariot of Israel, not Rome. Next I'd point out that scripture says Jesus is in heaven at the right hand of the Father interceding for us, it says He will return on a white horse at the end of the Tribulation. His "angel" could conceivably appear to someone but why? Why should He appear to anyone at all between His Ascent and His return, and especially considering that these "prophecies" are really pretty silly and trivial? There is no hint whatever that that could happen. Even in a vision. Even a vision to be biblically believable would have to fit what it teaches. He's to come on a white horse. A Roman chariot drawn by horses is completely out of charcter. She also said he had a peaceful smile on His face. An odd little point I suppose, but Jesus is simply never ever describing in scripture as smilibng. Being human I suppose he must have smiled but scripture simply never says He did. I do take that little thing as a falsification of her claim.
In another vision or dream she is in a room with some people listening to "Jesus" whose words, according to her dream, were utterly riveting,fascinating and compelling, and yet, oddly she gives not one example of anything He actually said that was so riveting. She even says she forgot what He said, just remembered how impressive it felt at the time. How can she believe herself when she says something like this? Jesus' words in scripture ARE riveting because of His message, and we aren't expected to accept their power on authority, we experience it when we read it. This is just too too strange, so clearly a deception.
She does make predictions and I can only wonder if any of them have ever come true. Predictions about Trump for instance, as if he's coming back to the Presidency very soon. Really? She identifies Biden as a false President who was not fairly elected, and gives as her evidence of this that if he had been he'd have the blessing of God, but the voting controversy at least means he doesn't or something like that. But this is bad theology. If God is judging the nation as certainly appears to be the case then we are going to have false leaders who oppose Him. This is seen all through scripture, there is no justification for any idea that our leaders would have God's blessing in any sense other than that God is behind absolutely everythiong that happens. If we have a bad President it is God's will no less than our having a good President. She seems to deny that the nation is under justment, she does seem to have mostly positive sounding prophecies. The latest one is that we are going to return to the gold and silver standard. Really? Most prophecy watchers see the world going to a cashless system, the exact opposite.
If I spent more time on it I'd probably find many more clues to the deceptive nature of her visions and dreams. They are not coming from God. I do pray for her that God would free her from these lies, and disabuse any of her followers of he errors. We are certainly in the Last Days..
